Games and exercises for getting more awareness and social competences
By Brigitte Müller
 

 Perception Practises: Perception of space, group and self

1.                         Introduction: Participants one after the other say their name, profession and place. Only the name must be true. All the words have to start with the same letter.

2. All stand in a circle. One does one step to the middle, saying the name and combine it with a move. All the others repeat name and move. The one who introduced himself can tell the others that they should do his move smaller or bigger. They repeat three times name and move doing it every time a little smaller or bigger.

3. Yes-No-Circle: All participants stand in a circle. One starts to clap his hands in direction to the left or right neighbour. If he claps to the left he has to say “yes”, if he claps to the right he has to say “no”. The neighbour decides in which direction and with which word he continues.

Ø  Giving the clap round the circle, without saying anything.

Ø  Giving the clap not to the next neighbour, but to anybody in the group.

Ø  Giving the clap together with the name.

Ø  Giving the clap together with words (free associations, words with the same letters

4.. All move in the room corresponding with the own mood, then try to  notice the others in the room, when the leader gives an accustic sign, all stop, find a partner and look at his/her feet, noses, T-Shirts…, say their names and go away.

5. All move in the room and try to notice all the things in the room. After a while the leader (gives a sign) oder "says: …" . All close their eyes and try to answer the questions (but silently, without saying anything) about e.g. the colour of the floor, how many people with glasses are in the room, how many windows…

6. Two partners, one has his eyes closed, the other one is the leader, who carefully leads the „blind“ one through the room. At certain places the seeing one stops and let the “blind one” touch the point. The “blind” one then can open his eyes quickly, close them again  and walk on. After a while the partners change their roles.

7.Two groups stand in a row opposite, so that everyone has a partner, whom he watches carefully. After the leader gave a sign, all turn and change three things. When everyone has finished, they turn again and find out, what the partner has changed.

8. In a circle: give a funny face to your neighbour and he tries to copy the face, turns to his next neighbour with another funny face.

9. Mirror Practices: Two partners copy the movements (later feelings) of each other. One starts to be the leader, after a while they change roles.

10. Everyone bobs up and down, make the decision to walk in mind, breath in, make a noise, walk as long as you have breath, stop, bob up and down…..

11. Without speaking: Line up in order of height. Line up in order of names. Line up in order of names…

12. Everybody, who likes.....

All sit in a circle. There’s one chair less than students. One student stands in the middle of the circle. When she or he says:” Everybody, who likes ice-cream”, everybody who likes ice-cream has to stand up and try to find another empty chair to sit down again. (It’s not allowed to go back to the chair one has left.) During the time, the students are busy with finding another seat, the one who was in the middle, tries to find a seat as well. The one who can’t find a chair, continues the game. (You can try to find out about hobbies, favourites, skills, families…..)

Cooperation

1.  All move in the room as different animals.

• Everyone on his or her own, silent
• Everyone on his or her own with noises
• Meet the other animals, silent
• Meet the other animals with noises
• Moves in slow motion
• Find a partner or build small groups and prepare a little play (with or without words). Begin and end the play as sculpture.

2. Bears Game: All move through the room as different animals. When the leader stops, you find a partner. One is the tree and stands still, the other one is the bear, which delightfully rubs his back at the tree.

3. All stand in a circle. One goes to the centre and says: “I am the tree”. (and stands like a tree.) The next one joins with another sentence (e.g) “I am the cat.” The next one joins with a new role. When the forth person comes, he/she has to send away one of the others, so that always only three people remain in the centre.

4. Human machine. One person starts with a motion and a noise like a machine. One after another, everyone joins. At the end the whole group is like a big machine. The machine can “work” quicker or break down at the end.

5. Blind circle: All stand somewhere in the room and close their eyes. Now they try to build a circle with eyes closed and without talking.

6. The sun

All sit in a circle. In the middle lays a yellow paper-circle (the sun). Everyone has one yellow paper stripe. One starts, stands up and goes to another one in the circle to tell her or him something kind. When he goes to the chosen one, he connects the partner with the sun, by laying the stripe on the floor. He returns to his place afterwards. Then the chosen one stands up …. At the end of the game, there is a sun with many sunrays on the floor.

7. What do we have in common?

One person leaves the room. The others agree on something, some of them have in common. Those people stand up and the one, who was outside comes in again and has to find out, what the common thing is.

8. Keep the waterball in the air while the group is counting to 10. The ball has to stay in the air, mustn’t fall down, hit the ceiling or wall or being beaten by the same person twice.

9. Chairs are distributed in the room. One stays empty. One person stands far away from this chair and has to try to occupy the empty chair. She has to move with little steps. The group has to try to prevent the empty chair from being occupied.

10. All move in the room. When one stops, all the others stop as well, one starts to go down, the others follow, heads should be at the same level – lay down, stand up again, again heads at the same level, until everyone stands… one gives a sign, all start to walk, get faster until one runs, ….

11. Cranes and penguins

All stand in the room. One is the first penguin. All the others are cranes and move slowly with big steps in the room. The penguin goes with very little, fast steps, the arms stay at the body and tries to catch a crane. Has he touched one, the crane turns into a penguin and both are chasing the cranes until everyone has turned into a penguin.